It's You VS You
Feeling defeated or not achieving your goals is a horrible feeling and doesn’t help your self esteem. I am sure in one situation or another this has happened to you and what do you do? Blame something or someone else, its their fault not mine, they didn’t support me, they didn’t help me, something got in the way, etc etc etc. By doing so this takes the pressure off of our selves and we feel better about it and can move on quicker, because “its not your fault”. This can be with you’re boss, friends, family member, partner, co worker or even your trainer but 99% of the time it is down to you. You can come up with every excuse in the book but that wont change anything.
Take your fitness goals for example, let's say you had a goal in mind and you set out with full intention of reaching it but soon fall off track and end up not making any change at all. You may say it’s your partner’s fault they didn’t support me, your families fault because they weren’t eating healthy so you couldn’t, you may blame your genetics or blame your trainer as its their plan. Its still down to you and you only, none of these excuses matter. Your partner didn’t support you? Did you ask for more support, did they force feed you the wrong foods, Probably not. How about your family? Did they make you eat the same as them, did you attempt to make your own food instead or be more mindful of how much you ate. Its your genetics letting you down? well your body still works the same as everyone else, it’s not different rules for your body. Its your trainers fault? Have you followed the plan 100%, have you been exercising and eating the calories they set you or do you just turn up to the one or two sessions you paid for a week then expect results.
No matter what your excuse is its down to one person and that person is you. Now I know these things aren’t easy, family members and friends can be unsupportive, they are scared of the change and they love you unconditionally. But they aren’t the ones who feel the way you do in your skin, only you know how that feels so you need to make the change regardless of their thoughts. Your trainer can give you everything you need to know, workouts, nutrition plans, mindset hacks but you are the one who needs to put the work in and stay on top of it 24/7. Chances are they see you a couple times a week thats two hours a week what are you doing for the rest of the one hundred and sixty six of them. Even if you go gym five times per week thats still fraction of your week what are you doing in the rest of those hours?
Going through a body transformation is scary you’re trying new things you have had to sacrifice things to some degree, but you can’t put a price on your health and confidence. You will be told you need to enjoy every bit of it, nothing should be difficult. But lets be honest you will find parts of it tough, you wont enjoy every single work out, you wont enjoy every single meal, there will be times you want to skip the gym or just eat crap for the day. Is that quick fix of satisfaction really worth out doing all your hard work and your future goals of being healthier, happier and fitter? You really need to decide what is important to you, living a longer, healthier and more active life or 5 seconds of pleasing your tastebuds? Don’t get me wrong you shouldn’t follow any exercise routine you hate and don’t look forward to or eat stuff that you are having to force down, however there will be sacrifices you have to make in order to achieve your goals. If you don’t it wont be long until you are blaming something or someone else.
This is where the determination and achievements start to come, now you have accepted that it is solely down to you it's time to put that work in and reap the amazing benefits. The crazy thing is the healthier you are the more you can get away with, to some degree. Ever seen someone fitter and healthier than you eat loads of crap but not gain any weight? That’s because they have put that hard work in. I know of people who can eat a whole pizza a tub of ice cream and not put on weight, myself included. This doesn’t mean that the world is unfair and its only our genetics that help us stay slim, its because we train hard and keep active. Holding more muscle than fat will have you burning more calories per day. I can consume 2500-2600 calories and lose weight due to being more active and retaining more muscle than fat. The average man needs 2500 calories to just maintain their weight so you are looking at 2000-2200 calories to lose weight. Thats how I can get away with losing weight whilst eating a chocolate bar or a donut, because I can consume an extra 300-500 calories more not cause my body works different to yours. (for the record I don’t eat that on a daily basis, but I don’t have to worry too much if I do). For women it is harder to lose weight, men can lose weight with an extra 500 calories which is an extra meal. This is where you need to be more careful with portion sizing, if you are eating the same portions as your partner/family member you will gain weight.
If you are sat there reading this like its all well and good saying all this but you still don’t know what to do, don’t worry I got you covered. Lets go over some things to help you achieve your goals and how making yourself accountable will give you success rather than blaming others for your failure.
Write Down Your Goals - Get a notebook write down your long term goals, whether its lose 12kg or gain 8kg in a year. Next break it down into short term goals, lose 1kg a month or gain 0.66kg per month. Losing 12kg or gaining 8kg seems so far away and can be daunting but losing 1.25kg a month or 0.67lbs per week is a very achievable goal and sounds a lot easier to achieve once broken down. This also help you to measure your progress along the way.
Setting Up To Win - You cant expect to win if you don’t plan or practice, ever hear of anyone just turning up to the the Olympics one day and beating those who have planned and practised over 4 years plus for that day? No. First lets find out how many calories your body needs to either lose or gain weight, you can find this through google and write it in your notebook. Next you need to find out what foods you like fit in to these calories you can do this by entering the foods in a calorie counter app such as MyFitness pal. Once you have found out how much you can eat you need to plan your activity. If you never stepped foot in the gym don’t plan to go five times per week, plan for one gym session and going for a walk only five minutes per day. If you can stick to this for a week without failing add two gym sessions per week, if you maintain that for a week again up it to three and so on. If you are looking to add weight this will be different you need to plan to hit the gym a minimum of three times per week otherwise you will be gaining fat not muscle.
Don’t Be Afraid - I have seen and trained so many people who are afraid to track their results, me included sometimes. You are scared to step on the scales or measure yourself because you’re afraid you haven’t achieved any results. But if you don’t check weekly or bi weekly how do you know if what your doing is correct. Imagine not checking for three months and then discovering you have not achieved anything, how disappointed would you be and you’ll think what a waste of three months. Whereas if you checked every week or every other week and you haven’t achieved anything you can say “right what I have done this past week or two hasn’t worked, lets adjust what i’m doing”. But don’t take this the wrong way and weigh yourself all the time, your weight will fluctuate from water intake umpteen times a day. I have seen people weigh themselves three times in a workout, you will not lose fat in this time, just water.
That's all I want you to focus on don’t over complicate it with trying too many different things this is a marathon NOT a sprint. The more you try to change the more you will struggle and the quicker you will quit and start blaming someone or something else again. Remember its down to you and no one else, excuses will not get you results but making yourself accountable will.
I hope this helps you all in achieving your goals, there will be times that are tough, there will be times you want to quit, but you will feel better breaking through them and achieving rather than being knocked back by them and failing.
If you really do struggle for support and knowledge I do offer services that cover these things as well as a free facebook group with people going through the same journey so feel free to request to join.
If you have any other questions you can contact me through my facebook page The Lemon Frog Fitness Company, my Instagram @lemon_frog_fitness or email louis@lemonfrogfitness.org.
Thanks for reading :)
